About Me

Gerry Dantone is the founder and former coordinator for the Center for Inquiry - Long Island Community and founder & President of Long Island Secular Humanists. He edited the CFI-LI INQUIRER for 11 years and has contributed to Free Inquiry magazine. He has appeared on CNN, FoxNews and local TV and radio. In addition, Gerry Dantone is a singer-songwriter-music producer for his band UniversalDice.com. You may visit their websites, see below.

Wednesday, November 9, 2016

It was a bad day for voters; the presidential candidate that more voters voted for than any other candidate lost the election. The person with the second most votes won the election. This is the second time in the last 5 presidential elections that this has happened. Since the party in power has now benefited both times from this absurd system, nothing will change. The U.S. will remain the only country in the world where losing the popular vote is sometimes better than winning it. We do not have a democracy; instead we play a game with odd rules that often rewards something other than the will of the people. Instead of making everyone's vote count equally, some votes in some states are relatively irrelevant while some votes in a handful of states are all important.

It was bad day for Muslims; the president elect has stated he wanted to ban Muslims from entering the country on the basis of their religious beliefs. Other religious folk, no matter how dangerous, crazy and un-American their beliefs may be are welcome as long as they are not Muslims. Furthermore, the president elect has hallucinated seeing thousands of Muslims on the roofs of homes in Jersey City, New Jersey, celebrating the attack on the World Trade Center back in 2001 on TV.

It was a bad day for women who have been sexually assaulted. They now have a president elect who has bragged about sexually assaulting women and we have all seen the women who have been the victims he claims to have assaulted. He has insulted them horribly for confirming his own claims.

It was a bad day for women who may sometime have an unwanted or dangerous pregnancy. They may be forced to have their babies, even if they are the victims of rape or if the pregnancy poses a danger to their lives.

It was a bad day for women who are not fashion model thin; for women who are over 35 which is "check-out" time according to the president elect; for women who are "nasty"; for women who do not have huge breasts; or for women who have faces the president elect does not like.

It was a bad day for persons with pre-existing conditions. It was a bad day for young adults under 26 who have been insured under their parents health insurance plans. They may lose their health insurance sometime soon. Even those who complain about their premiums exploding may have second thoughts when they try to buy their insurance outside of the exchanges created by the ACA and lose their subsidies - as they would have had to do before Obamacare was created.

It was a bad day for those who are scientifically oriented and have concerns about global warming and the teaching of evolution in schools.

It was a bad day for people who are appalled that a candidate encouraged the illegal hacking of his opponent's email account. At the same time the president elect never offered to release his own tax returns, much less his own emails.

It was a bad day for people who care about the deficit. The president elect's budget plans would explode the deficit - but will there be fights over the debt ceiling by Republicans in the next 4 years as there were in the previous 4 years?

It was a bad day for the undocumented - even if they are persons who were brought here as children and have known no other country. All are to be deported, period.

It was a bad day for most taxpayers who will have a greater share of the tax burden after the rich get their incredible tax cuts.

It was a bad day for persons who believe corporations are not people. Future supreme court judges will be chosen, in part, based on their inability to tell the difference between a human person and a corporation.

It was a bad day for future victims of gun violence. Not only will no reasonable gun laws be passed but even research and record collection of gun related crimes and violence will remain prohibited because some do not want to know the truth.

It was a bad day for those with disabilities. The president elect has no problem mocking you.

It was a bad day for those who value honesty and rationality. Most of what the president elect said during the campaign was untrue and why should that change now? The campaign that began with birtherism ended with false claims too numerous to list.

It was a bad day for Americans; the campaign that said "we are stronger together" lost; the one that said "lock her up" won.